Why You Should Know How to Read Microexpressions

Have you ever felt butterflies in your stomach just before a job interview or a presentation in front of a large audience? Of course, you have!

You might have wondered “How will I know if they’re liking my work” or “What questions could they ask me or even “I hope I don’t pass out!” Your anxiety, both ahead of, and during the actual event, actually stems from the challenge of reading people’s reactions.

Say, you’re in the middle of responding to a question posed by your interviewer and you see a side of the interviewer’s lip twitch up. You think the person is pleased and is smiling. But the person is actually showing signs of contempt! Instead of steering your response to the desired answer, you carry on.

We often feel clueless when it comes to gauging the attitudes and dispositions of the people we meet, especially when the interaction is taking place real-time. While in conversation, people respond to what we’re saying by subconsciously, but constantly, transmitting signals that map our true emotions through flitting facial expressions — or microexpressions. Originating with the work of Paul Ekman and his associates, there are now a number of resources available to help identify, understand, and interpret microexpressions. You may also want to look up the 7 universally acknowledged microexpressions, each of which is mapped to specific facial expressions.

The findings of Ekman are particularly insightful. First, microexpressions are universal across cultures — your immediate supervisor in New Delhi or the Vice President based in Nigeria express anger through an almost identical movement of their facial muscles. Second, microexpressions remain unchanged across age levels— directors, managers, and associates express contempt, for example, through the same momentary facial expressions. This particular emotion is identified in a person when the corner of his mouth goes up involuntarily, even if for a fraction of a second.

My work over the past 23 years as a management consultant and advisor has involved close interactions with over a thousand professionals in Fortune 500 companies, across various geographies and age groups. Based on the findings presented in my book, From Command to Empathy: Using EQ in the Age of Disruption, here’s a 3-step process that can help you leverage people’s microexpressions.

READ – Imagine you’re in the middle of making a presentation during your interview and one corner of the interviewer’s mouth goes up for an instant. You’ve just stated some market research and your point of view on it. If you practice how to read microexpressions, you can identify this microexpression as contempt.

REFLECT – You now ask yourself: Why is the person reacting in that way? Did I say something I shouldn’t have or did I say too much?

REACT – Realizing the answer, you calibrate the next statement in your presentation.

This is a great opportunity to show your interviewer that you understand his response, even though it was not explicit, and ask if anything was unclear or if he didn’t agree with your judgement. It’s also a great way to engage the interviewer and show that you’re attentive.

All of this can happen within a matter of seconds, so being super-quick is key. Being able to read and understand microexpressions can instantly tell you how the other person is feeling. This can become a powerful personal tool for you to gain the psychological edge in complex inter-personal interaction at the workplace and beyond.